Jessa Crispin

Earth

THE GLOBAL BOOK COMMUNITY Interviews, Reviews, Articles, Essays and Poetry. Online & Offline Book Clubs. New York | London | Los Angeles | Sydney

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Articles

How Biden and the Democrats betrayed America

3 weeks ago | telegraph.co.uk | Jessa Crispin

Original Sin, by Jake Tapper & Alex Thompson, reveals how Biden's decline was covered up - but is its punchy narrative too convenient? If, as the cliché goes, success has many fathers but failure is an orphan, then Original Sin is an attempt, six months on, to find a parent for Joe Biden's disastrous re-election campaign. Somebody, after all, must take responsibility for the return of Donald Trump to the White House; and as far as this book is concerned, the fault is Biden's own.
Losing My Religion

2 months ago | thebaffler.com | Ranbir Sidhu |Astra Taylor |Quinn Slobodian |Jessa Crispin

A year ago, I took a friend visiting from California to a casual mixer at a rooftop bar in Athens, Greece, where I live. The mixer was arranged by the local chapter of Democrats Abroad, a get-out-the-vote organization for expat Americans in Europe. With drinks in hand and the sun setting on the Parthenon in the distance, we pushed ourselves into the knot of Americans at the far end of the patio.
Role Models, by Jessa Crispin

2 months ago | harpers.org | Jessa Crispin

From What Is Wrong with Men, a study of how portrayals of the American man have changed in films starring Michael Douglas, which will be published next month by Pantheon.
Curtis Sittenfeld’s new stories are like a bowl of spaghetti without the depravity of her Hillary Clinton novel

Feb 20, 2025 | m.independent.ie | Jessa Crispin

Show Don’t Tell features an unsurprising procession of Ally McBeal-ish protagonists who just want to do their bestIt’s never comfortable when a novelist starts to have a shtick. Uncomfortable, for obvious reasons, for the critic, and too comfortable, to the point of being cosy, for the reader. You know before you open the book who the characters will be; the beats and rhythm of the plot; how everything will be wrapped up in the end. It’ll all be adequate, but not in the slightest challenging.
Show Don’t Tell by Curtis Sittenfeld: 3-star review

Feb 15, 2025 | telegraph.co.uk | Jessa Crispin |Curtis Sittenfeld

It’s never comfortable when a novelist starts to have a shtick. Uncomfortable, for obvious reasons, for the critic, and too comfortable, to the point of being cosy, for the reader. You know before you open the book who the characters will be; the beats and rhythm of the plot; how everything will be wrapped up in the end. It’ll all be adequate, but not in the slightest challenging. It will satisfy you like a big bowl of spaghetti.
Is California a progressive dreamland? No, for all these reasons

Feb 5, 2025 | telegraph.co.uk | Jessa Crispin

There’s a trick some non-fiction writers pull, in order to demonstrate to the reader, right off the bat, that they know a lot of stuff. It’s simple: they list it like a human Wikipedia page.
Bang the World | Adrian Nathan West

Jan 6, 2025 | thebaffler.com | Adrian West |Rafia Zakaria |Jessa Crispin

One in a thousand people has six toes or fingers. Twenty-six percent of young people lack a gag reflex. And about two in seven dudes, according to my own research as a participant observer, will say something skeevy about women in exclusively male company. Case in point: a recent Saturday after jiujitsu practice, when a panting and sweaty group of guys, some regulars and some newcomers, were gathered at the edge of the mat getting to know each other.
Melania Trump’s memoir is deeply weird – and hard to believe

Oct 8, 2024 | telegraph.co.uk | Jessa Crispin

Melania Trump’s memoir, writes Jessa Crispin, is ‘a profoundly sad document’ Alex Edelman While I was reading Melania Trump’s memoir, I thought of Marie Antoinette. Not the historical queen of France, whose reign came to an end after her people, who’d been left to suffer through years of deprivation and chaos, overthrew the monarchy and chopped off her head. No: I was thinking of the 2006 film, directed by Sofia Coppola and starring a cheeky Kirsten Dunst. For Marie Antoinette, Coppola...
Do Swifties really care about the music?

Sep 16, 2024 | newhumanist.org.uk | Jessa Crispin

I didn’t understand Taylor Swift fans until I married a football supporter. The pop star’s intense fandom had confused me for quite a while. Her songs seemed bland and formulaic, her image wholesome, and her interiority – at least what we are allowed to see of it – too shallow for such vigorous and repeated delving. Swift’s arc, from cute Nashville country star to billionaire pop priestess, is one of total cultural domination.
Where is Kamala's plan for women?

Sep 1, 2024 | unherd.com | Jessa Crispin

AbortionChristianityDemocratic PartyFeminismKamala HarrisReligionSocietyUS While Joe Biden found it hard to even say the A-word, Kamala Harris has always known that reproductive rights could be a winning issue for the Left come November — hence her reproductive freedom tour earlier this year.